There are a wide variety of zero insertion force electrical connectors particularly adapted for terminating flat cables, such as flexible flat cables, flexible printed circuit boards and the like. These electrical connectors conventionally have a housing mounting a plurality of terminals in a generally parallel array spaced along an elongated opening or slot for receiving an end of the flat cable. Typically, these connectors use actuators to push the flexible flat cables, flexible printed circuit boards or the like against resilient contact portions of the terminals.
The actuators of these flat cable connectors typically are movable between a first position allowing free insertion of the flat cable into the elongated opening or slot in the housing, and a second position wherein a pressure plate of the actuator biases the cable against the contact portions of the terminals. For instance, the end of the flat cable may be stripped of its insulation so that the pressure plate biases exposed conductors of the cable against the contact portions of the terminal.
One of the ever-increasing problems with flat cable connectors of the character described above, involves manually manipulating the housing, the actuator and the cable to terminate the cable. Simply put, there are three components that must be manipulated, and the operator has only two hands. This problem is becoming more prominent with the ever-increasing elongation of such connectors to accommodate more and more terminals. In other words, to carry out a termination operation, the operator must hold the connector with one hand and insert and hold the cable with the other hand, while using one or both of the hands to move the actuator while the cable is still being held in the opening or slot of the housing. Quite often, the cable moves or shifts while the actuator is being moved, resulting in an inadequate or defective termination. It can be understood that this problem is magnified as the connectors become longer to accommodate more terminals. The present invention is directed to solving these problems.